


everything is bright now

by scott_mccall



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Falling In Love, Fluff, Multi, POV Malia, POV Scott, Polyamory, Pre-Season 5
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-27
Updated: 2015-11-27
Packaged: 2018-05-03 09:07:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,518
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5284925
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scott_mccall/pseuds/scott_mccall
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kira smiles, a big, bright smile, and draws a vanilla heart on her cupcake. “Here,” she says, passing it to Malia. “It’s for you.”</p><p>Malia takes the cupcake.</p>
            </blockquote>





	everything is bright now

**Author's Note:**

> written for [spectacular gwenan](http://www.tylrpozey.tumblr.com). happy birthday! luv u!
> 
> mostly canon compliant but w/ a couple of minor changes, like kira coming back from new york early and malia breaking up with stiles. and scott/kira/malia happening ofc lmao.  
> i apologize for the tags, i am terrible and new to this site and i'm not sure what to classify this as.  
>  
> 
> [tumblr](http://www.masonhewiit.tumblr.com)

    It’s late.

    Scott lost track of time a while ago, somewhere towards the end of the first season of Orange is the New Black. Kira fell asleep two episodes ago, and Scott hasn’t had the heart to wake her up. She’s tucked into his side, her breath hot on his chest, sleeping peacefully. The volume on the laptop is so quiet, it’s almost off—he’s using his enhanced hearing to listen to both the show and the sound of Kira’s heart. He feels completely at peace; safe with Kira.

    The stairs creak.

    Scott barely has time to hear the heartbeat outside of his room before the door flings open to reveal a distressed, sweat-covered Malia.

    “Malia?” he whispers, mindful of Kira. “What’s wrong?”

    “I—” Malia breaks off before she can even say anything. She runs a hand through her freshly cut hair. “I broke up with Stiles. About an hour ago. I went for a walk and I—I didn’t mean to end up here. I’m sorry.” She’s already backing out of the room.

    “Oh,” Scott says. He glances at his phone. It’s been silent all night. He would’ve expected Stiles to call him or text him at least. “Hey, Malia—don’t go.” He shuts the laptop and slides it carefully onto the nightstand, trying not to disturb Kira. “C’mere,” he whispers, shifting over in the bed so there’s room for her next to him. “Stay.”

    Malia swallows. “Are you sure?”

    Scott nods, and Malia curls on top of the covers, nestling into the crook of his arm. She smells salty and Scott assumes it’s from the sweat, but he’s pretty sure she’s been crying, too. He’s not sure why she broke up with Stiles, and he doesn’t plan on prying into it. If Malia wants to talk about it, she’ll talk. She certainly doesn’t need anyone making her uncomfortable. He presses a kiss to her temple and tightens his arm around her, unconsciously protective.

    Malia falls asleep within minutes.

 

 

    Scott is glad Melissa isn’t home, because he’s not sure what she’d say if she saw him come downstairs with two girls instead of one, and at half past twelve, to boot. (Probably nothing, he points out to himself. Melissa rarely jumps to conclusions, especially when it comes to his sex life.) He starts a pot of coffee and grabs a bowl of fresh fruit out of the fridge.

    “We should do something before school starts,” Kira calls from the living room. Scott makes his way over with the fruit and a couple forks and sets them down on the coffee table. Malia and Kira are practically sitting on top of each other on the couch, and Scott, not wanting to bother them, sits on the floor on the other side of the coffee table.

    “Something like what?” Scott asks. He stabs a piece of watermelon with his fork and eats it.

    “I don’t know,” Kira says. “Maybe a beach day. Or—ooh, what about a beach _weekend_? We can all go; the whole pack.”

    Scott glances at Malia. The whole pack includes Stiles, and he’s not sure how bad things are with the two of them. He had told Kira about the breakup earlier, in a hushed voice while Malia was showering. Malia just shrugs and bites into a strawberry. “Sound good to me,” she says in between bites. Scott breathes out, relieved.

    “I should be able to get a weekend off from the clinic,” he tells Kira. “I think it could be a great idea.”

    “It’ll take time to get all the details together,” Kira muses, “but I think we could make this work. I’ll talk to everyone else and see if they’re in. Scott, you can be in charge of getting food. Malia, how’s your driving coming along?”

    Malia grimaces. “Not good.”

    “Great. You can improve it by helping out with transportation.”

    “So… you want me to crash my new car?”

    Kira sighs. “You won’t crash. Lydia will be with you. So will I.” She shoots a look at Scott. “The boys can all go in Stiles’s Jeep. I’ll ask Lydia to get hotel reservations, and we can all pitch in to cover the cost. And I’ll do everything else,” she adds, a smile lighting up her face.

    “We still have to see if the others want to,” Scott points out. The coffee machine beeps and he moves into the kitchen. Malia and Kira start talking about the lunch date they have planned with Lydia in a couple days while he prepares three cups of coffee—after several pack sleepovers over the summer, he knows exactly how they take their coffee. By the time he returns to the living room, the two girls have moved on to talking about the upcoming school year. He adds a few comments here and there, and eventually excuses himself to go call Stiles. He can’t help but be worried—Stiles still hasn’t called or texted him.

    “Yo,” Stiles answers on the third ring. “What’s up?”

    “Hey,” Scott says. “How are you?”

    “I’m great. Why?”

    “Malia’s here.”

    “Oh.”

    Stiles falls silent, and Scott hesitantly asks, “You wanna talk about it?”

    “No,” Stiles says. “I’m fine, dude. I promise. It’s just—you know, she’s got a really strong personality. It isn’t weird, though, it was a mutual agreement. It was probably a long time coming, anyway.”

    “Okay. Well, if you need anything—”

    “Yeah, don’t worry, Scott. I’ll call you.”

 

* * *

 

    Malia leaves with Kira later that day, with the intent to sleep over.

    The intent is long forgotten by four in the morning, when the girls are still wide awake. Kira’s parents have a huge collection of old board games, which the two have been trying to figure out all night in addition to watching movies. Halfway through a confusing round of Plateau, Kira announces that she plans on dropping the beach weekend idea.

    “Why?” Malia asks, adding another piece to her stack. She’s got five now. Kira breathes a curse and runs a hand through her hair. “I thought it was a good idea.”

    “Yeah, but I don’t know anymore.” Kira starts to move one of her red pieces and stops, reconsidering. “I’d love to do it, obviously, but I can’t shake this feeling that something terrible is going to happen if we leave Beacon Hills.”

    “Prime example of why we should get out for a couple days,” Malia snorts. “This place has us scared to the point where we’re just waiting for someone to try to kill us. Did you feel like that when you went to New York with your parents?”

    “No,” Kira admits. She moves her red piece and captures one of Malia’s blue ones. “But that was different—there were still people here who could keep it safe while I was gone. This time it’d be all of us leaving, and that sounds like a disaster waiting to happen. It’s like we’re all tethered here, and if we go, something really, really bad is going to happen.”

    Malia frowns. For someone so light-hearted and kind, Kira sure can be depressing as hell. “If you don’t think we should do it, I can respect that. Don’t people always say you should trust your gut?”

    “Yeah.” Kira is quiet for a minute, watching as Malia captures one of her pieces. “I’m glad you stayed over.”

    “I’m glad, too,” Malia says. The two fall silent, but Malia can tell from the way the other girl keeps looking at her out of the corner of her eye that Kira wants to ask about Stiles. She sighs. “I broke up with Stiles because I didn’t think we had anything solid.” She swallows and stares at her stack, refusing to meet Kira’s eyes. “It felt like we were just together for the sake of being together and I—I don’t want that from a relationship. I want something else. Something meaningful. And I don’t want to talk about it,” she finishes.

    “Okay,” Kira says, and she leaves it at that.

  

 

    The girls don’t end up sleeping at all.

    They slip downstairs at six in the morning and make breakfast together, stifling laughter every time one of them bumps into the other. Kira shushes Malia whenever she makes a loud noise, whispering about not waking up her parents, and Malia flicks water on her in return, making her squeal. Water drops turn into dabs of soft butter, and butter turns into smears of the mashed avocado they were planning on putting on their toast.

    By the time Mr. and Mrs. Yukimura get up, the kitchen is a mess and the girls are slumped over cups of coffee, trying desperately to stay awake.

    “We’re gonna clean it up,” Malia mumbles into her mug. “I swear.”

    Noshiko looks faint, which Malia thinks is a bit of an overreaction. After all, the woman’s been alive for over nine hundred years—she has to have seen worse shit than a dirty kitchen. Then again, Malia reminds herself, there’s an awful lot of food in places where it doesn’t belong (like, for example, the jelly on the cabinets).

    “Sorry,” Kira says, and she sounds adorably sheepish. “We really didn’t mean to make a mess. Things just… got out of hand.” She giggles, something that Malia has discovered she does excessively when she’s sleep-deprived.

    “We’ll just go out,” Ken says. He’s staring at his daughter like she grew a third eye. Malia waves half-heartedly as the couple leaves, but her hand drops flat on the countertop the second the door shuts behind them. She groans and drains the rest of her coffee.

    They sit in silence for a good five minutes, staring into nothingness, before they finally drag themselves up to start cleaning up their mess. Kira tackles the cabinets, scrubbing away at the smudges, while Malia puts away the food that didn’t make it onto them. They don’t talk much, still groggy and tired, but once they start doing the dishes, they disintegrate back into the giggly mood from earlier—bubbles are blown onto arms and clothes, dishcloths are snapped against legs and backsides, and overdramatic renditions of overplayed pop songs are sung while the girls work.

    It’s easy for Malia to forget about the breakup when she’s with Kira.

    The euphoria wears off after an impossibly short amount of time, leaving Malia waving listlessly at Kira when she drops her off at her dad’s house. Malia wonders if this is how everyone feels after a breakup, or if it’s just her. Stiles _was_ her first boyfriend, so it’s not like she’s skilled in the relationships department to begin with, but it felt wrong when she had brought it up to Stiles. He hadn’t seemed shocked—or hurt—and she’s pretty sure most people involved in sudden breakups aren’t completely fine with it. She wonders if he saw it coming, or if he had been playing on doing the same thing.

    Regardless of how Stiles is feeling about the breakup, Malia feels pretty shitty. Not because she broke up with him—she meant it when she told Kira that she didn’t think their relationship was concrete—but because, now that he’s gone, she has an overwhelming feeling of something like loneliness that she can’t shake. Kira’s only been gone for a few minutes, but Malia misses her already and the TV isn’t helping to distract her.

    She misses Scott, too. He didn’t need to take her in the other night, but he did and she doesn’t know how she can repay him. She’s grateful she has him in her life—she’s not sure what she’d do without him. He’s her alpha, and she knows he cares about her a lot; which is why she doesn’t bat an eye when he texts her that night asking if she wants to come over.

 

> **_Scott:  
>  _ ** _Kira’s here too if that’s okay_

  

  The corners of her lips tug up, memories from that morning flooding her mind.

 

> _sounds great  
>  i’ll be over soon_

 

 

    As the summer draws closer to an end, Malia spends more and more time with Scott and Kira. She’s always afraid that she’s intruding, but Kira assures her, over baked goods in midday sunshine, that they don’t mind having her around.

    “We love you, Malia,” Kira says as she spreads chocolate frosting on a cupcake. “You don’t need to worry about anything. We’re going to be here no matter what.”

    “I feel kind of indebted to you,” Malia admits.

    “That’s stupid,” Kira retorts, and as soon as she’s said it, Malia realizes that it _is_ stupid. (She doesn’t know when it started, but now Kira seems to be her clarity. Every time she points out something, Malia can see everything as obviously as the sun spilling into the Yukimuras’ kitchen.) “You don’t owe Scott and I anything. We’re your friends. It’s what we’re supposed to do.”

    “I love you. Both of you.”

    Kira smiles, a big, bright smile, and draws a vanilla heart on her cupcake. “Here,” she says, passing it to Malia. “It’s for you.”

    Malia takes the cupcake.

 

 

    “Stiles and I are fine, Scott.”

    “When was the last time you talked to him?”

    Malia stares at the floor.

    “Look,” Scott sighs, “I’m not trying to make you do anything you don’t want to.” He takes Malia’s hand and gives it a gentle squeeze. “I just don’t want there to be any bad blood between you two. You’re both great friends of mine and I don’t want to see you fighting or anything.”

    “We won’t fight,” Malia whispers. “I don’t have any problems with him.”

    “Then why aren’t you talking to him?”

    “I don’t want to,” Malia says. A lump is forming in her throat. “I don’t think I’m ready for it.”

    “Okay,” Scott says. “Take your time.”

 

 

    Malia talks to Stiles a week later when the pack is hanging out at Scott’s house. It goes smoothly, easier than she had expected, and it’s like a weight is lifted off her chest. Scott gives her an appreciative smile when she does, and she knows he’s glad she finally talked to Stiles. She’s glad, too.

    She ends up falling asleep on the couch next to Scott, and before she knows it, she’s sleeping over all the time. Scott refuses to let her sleep on the couch after the first night and insists she sleep with him and, more often than not, Kira. Malia has never felt so wanted and loved in her life.

    She’s always comfortable, even when Scott and Kira sneak kisses that they think she can’t see.

    “You don’t have to do that,” Malia says one night after another hurried kiss.

    “We don’t want anything to be weird,” Kira says apologetically. Scott looks embarrassed.

    “It’s not weird. I don’t mind.”

    “Are you sure?” Scott asks. “We’ll stop if you—”

    “Scott,” Malia says. “I’ve seen you two kiss before. It’s fine.”

    After that, they stop trying to hide the kisses. Malia is grateful for that. She’s certainly not jealous of them, and she doesn’t want to be viewed as an obstacle in their relationship. As much as they want to make sure she’s comfortable, she doesn’t want to make them _un_ comfortable.

    So when she starts to think about what it’d be like to kiss Kira, she starts hating herself.

 

 

    “I need your help,” Malia announces.

    “Okay,” Lydia says. Malia hears a muffled bang on the other end of the phone and Lydia swears. “Ran into the desk,” she grumbles. “What do you need help with?”

    Malia runs a hand through her hair. “This is entirely confidential.”

    “Of course.”

    “I want to kiss a girl.”

    “Okay. What’s the problem?”

    “I can’t. I don’t know if she likes me like that.” _And she has a boyfriend._ “If I did kiss her, though, how would I go about that?”

    “Like any other kiss,” Lydia says unhelpfully. “You could ask her.”

    “I’m nervous,” Malia confesses.

    “Don’t be.”

 

 

    Malia doesn’t ask Kira.

    She’s afraid of what will happen. She’s afraid Kira will be horribly disgusted with her and Scott won’t want to let her sleep over ever again. The thought makes her sick. She doesn’t want to betray their friendship because she wants to know what it’s like to kiss a girl. (But really, she can’t lie to herself—she knows Kira is the only girl she wants to kiss.)

    She can’t help but wonder if it would’ve been easier to stay with Stiles.

 

 

    Malia starts noticing little things about both Kira and Scott. Little, tiny things, like the way Kira’s nose crinkles when she laughs, or how her hands twist together when she’s anxious. How Scott’s bounces on the balls of his feet when he’s excited, and how he can’t sleep unless he’s fluffed his pillows at least once. The thing that stands out the most is the way their eyes light up when they look at each other.

    Malia wishes she could have that.

 

 

    “Malia, are you okay? You’ve been distant lately and I’m worried about you.”

    “I’m fine, Scott,” Malia says.

    “If anything’s wrong, let us know,” Kira chimes in. “We’ll try to help.”

    “Nothing’s wrong, I swear. Hanging out with you guys has been really good for me.” Malia offers them a rare smile. “I’m happy to be here with you.”

    “Are you—do you—” Kira breaks off and bites her lower lip. “Did something happen?”

    “Guys, come on,” Malia groans. She flips over onto her stomach, propping herself up on her elbows. “If something was going on, you’d be the first to know.” She directs it to both of them, but she looks straight at Scott when she says it. She’s afraid he might hear her heartbeat; afraid he might find out that she isn’t telling the truth. She quickly realizes he isn’t listening to her heart—why would he be? He’s never had any reason to doubt her.

    It’s the first time she’s lied to his face, and she hates herself for it.

 

> _hey can we talk ?_
> 
> **_  
> Kira:_ **  
>  _Sure. Coffee at 10?_

 

 

    Malia stirs her coffee idly, eyeing Kira as she weaves her way through the small café with a latte in her hand. She’s starting to think, far too late, that this is a bad idea.

    “Hey,” Kira greets her. She slides into the seat across from Malia. “Sorry I’m late. What’s up?”

    “I’ve been thinking,” Malia starts, “about senior year.”

    “Oh, Malia, I’m sure you passed. They’d be stupid if they didn’t let you in; you’ve worked so hard—”

    “I’m not worried about that. Well, I am,” Malia corrects herself.  “But that’s not what I’m talking about.” She takes a deep breath, steeling herself for the worst. “I’m talking about you and Scott.”

    Kira’s eyebrows draw together. “What did we do? Have we been bothering you? I was afraid we were being over-bearing, but then you never said anything so I wasn’t sure. Oh God. I’m so sorry, I didn’t—”

    “No, it’s nothing like that.” Malia stirs her now-cold coffee again as she pieces together her next sentence. She practiced the conversation about a dozen times while she waited for Kira, but she still doesn’t know what she should say.

    “Malia?”

    “I think I’m in love with you two.”

 

* * *

 

   

“Refresh again.”

    “I refreshed it a minute ago,” Malia complains.

    “Three minutes, actually,” Kira pipes up. She lifts her phone. “I was keeping track.”

    “See? Refresh again,” Scott repeats. He cranes his neck, looking over the crowd of students filing past them. He still can’t find Stiles or Lydia. “They said they’d send it tonight.”

    “Fine,” Malia grumbles. She taps her phone’s screen, and then her foot while it slowly reloads. “This school’s wifi sucks.”

    Kira cheers as soon as Malia’s phone finishes loading. “Look! We told you! The email’s there,” she relays to Scott, who switches his focus to Malia instead of searching for the other two. “Open it!”

    Malia taps on the email, and they wait ten agonizing seconds for it to open. Malia scrolls down the length of the email, her eyes flicking back and forth, and the frown in between her eyes disappears. “I’m in!” she exclaims, a smile spreading across her face.

    “Yes!” Kira cheers again. She throws her arms around Malia, squeezing her so tightly Scott’s afraid she might not be able to breath. “I’m so happy for you!”

     “Congratulations,” Scott tells Malia. He grins and pulls her close to give her a kiss. “I love you.”

    “I love you, too,” Malia says. She’s beaming. “And you!” she adds to Kira. “C’mere.” She tosses an arm around Kira’s neck and kisses her deeply. She doesn’t break the kiss for an inappropriate amount of time, and her and Kira both burst into laughter as soon as they finish.

    “We have to get going,” Scott says. He’s still smiling, and his cheeks are starting to hurt. “I see Lydia over by the history classroom.”

    “Thank you for everything,” Malia says. Her smile is softer, more serious. “I love you guys so much.” She laces her fingers with Kira and offers Scott her other hand, which he gladly takes.

    “Let’s go sign a bookshelf.”


End file.
